Cem sees no short-term Cyprus solution

TURKISH Foreign Minister Ismail Cem said yesterday he saw no short-term solution for Cyprus, despite US envoy Richard Holbrooke’s fresh efforts to solve the dispute.

“This dispute is not solved by saying a marvellous negotiator has been appointed,” Cem told reporters in Ankara, referring to Holbrooke’s appointment in June as President Bill Clinton’s Cyprus envoy.

Holbrooke, the broker of the Bosnian peace agreement, visited Ankara earlier this month and met Cem for the first time since taking up the key post.

“I told Holbrooke that he should not expect a sudden breakthrough just because the actors had changed in the 23-year-old problem,” Cem said.

He said the first step to solve the division of the island should be recognition of the breakaway Turkish state in the north as an “equal counterpart” to the Greek state in the south.

Cem said the tense relationship between Turkey and Greece was also blocking a lasting solution.

“We have serious differences on the Cyprus issue with Greece. I tell my counterparts I do not think much will occur in Cyprus,” he said.

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.